


‘cause in my head, in my head (i do everything right)

by Ymae



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: F/F, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-26
Updated: 2020-03-26
Packaged: 2021-02-28 22:34:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,210
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23334718
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ymae/pseuds/Ymae
Summary: After Jeremiah's funeral, the Danvers, Kelly, and J'onn spend a quiet night in Midvale, trying to regain some sense of normalcy and lightness. Everything is not okay yet, but as always, Kara and Alex are there for each other.
Relationships: Alex Danvers & Kara Danvers, Alex Danvers/Kelly Olsen
Comments: 14
Kudos: 60





	‘cause in my head, in my head (i do everything right)

**Author's Note:**

> This is written from Alex's point of view so there's dealing with grief and guilt and addiction, and a panic attack - take care if that could be triggering for you!  
> Title is from Lorde's "supercut". My tumblr is lightning-in-your-teeth if you want to come say hi :)  
> 

They’re outside the church now. The funeral is over, and Alex takes a gulp of the fresh air. She’s sure she’s imagining it—trying to make sense of what happened, of what she did, what she got herself into—but the air tastes sweeter in the real world. She inhales, and immediately, she coughs. It’s fitting, she supposes; even her lungs are overwhelmed with this sharp reality.

She hadn’t even spent a day in the VR. It’s nothing, really, compared to how long she suspects her less lucky fellow players have been trapped in there, in a place where the air is stale, where everyone, even the people you love most, is your captor.

It’s frightening in a way she can barely express. Not the VR itself, really; more how fast it’d grown on her, how fast it had become the only air her lungs knew how to take.

It’s not that she’s not aware of her addiction tendencies. When everything’s fine—which it rarely is these days—she is, too. But when the walls start caving in on her again, because of a death or a crisis or the sharp comeback of her feeling out of place, _not good enough_ , then she starts to hold onto what she has too tightly. To the numbness of the alcohol, or training until she’s bruised all over. To long workdays and even longer nights. 

She gets addicted to loneliness, sometimes, to isolation,  although Kelly would probably say those are symptoms,  not conditions.  But there’s something addictive to bottling everything up just as there’s something addictive to security, to strength, to protecting people, to feeling in control. 

That’s what got to her. She knows that. 

But self-awareness doesn’t work as a cure.  She can be aware of her problems and still be an asshole.  Like today. 

Alex is still coughing, although now that’s transformed into hiccups.  She buries her hands in her jacket pockets,  bites her lip, and turns around to face her family. 

Her dad’s funeral was a small one. It’s hard to make friends as a twice-thought-dead Cadmus agent, she supposes, but at least his daughters have good ones; Nia had never even met him,  and Kelly is more of a funeral guest than he even deserves. 

She loves him, of course she does. It’ll always be present tense, even as it’s a shaky one.  But she’s angry, and she’s been angry for such a long time that it just feels like hatred, now. 

She’s embarrassed  by how much she’s cried today, but not all of her tears are for him;  some,  she shed for herself, though she’d never admit that.  For that girl that she saw in the virtual reality today, who’d loved her dad to pieces  until she felt herself sharply and unexpectedly  forgotten.  The woman she was a few years ago, who’d seen her father miraculously brought back to life, who’d seen a second chance when all she’d gotten was a broken, selfish man  who hadn’t wanted to come home to them anymore. 

She knows it’s not fair to him; he’d changed, allegedly. He’d done good. But all the anger that Alex had stored up, all the love she’d held onto, that couldn’t just disappear. The version of him he’d shown her was the only one she could grieve. 

It was time to let herself do just that. It was time to let go of all that furious hope.  Kara would say to never let  go of hope,  but maybe even that feeling had an addictive quality. 

It was time to let go. 

Suddenly, unexpectedly, Alex’s hiccup  breaks into a sob.  She puts a hand in front of her mouth, tries to turn around—she  is sick of the tears, and she  isn’t going to face her family like this—but a hand on her shoulder  stops her. 

Kind blue eyes  meet hers.  Kara. Of course. 

There  are tears in her eyes too,  and Alex  pulls her into a hug.  She’s  still her little sister,  although Jeremiah  doesn’t need to protect her anymore.  Her little sister who  understands anger,  understands grief, but  has no tools to deal with it when it’s Alex who’s yelling at her, and that’s okay. 

She’s glad it  was Kelly by her side this afternoon. She’s glad Kara didn’t have to see her trapped in a reality where she’d taken her place.  She might have mistaken  Alex wanting to be Supergirl for jealousy when really it wasn’t.  It was a need to be powerful and in control, the way Supergirl presented herself.  Alex, too, wished she could put on a persona, a cape, and appear strong to  _someone._ Be able to save  _someone._ Even if it wasn’t her dad. 

Kara tightens her grip on her as if she senses her thoughts, and Alex whispers, on impulse, “Do you think virtual reality knows how your heart beats?” 

Kara pulls away, wipes a hand over her eyes.  She looks concerned, but not furious,  which is so much more than Alex deserves. 

“I just… I heard yours, and it was really nice,” Alex says. “I get why you do that now.” 

“You heard my heart in Andrea’s VR?” Kara asks and looks just a little bit crestfallen. (Alex understands; the technology is dangerous. Kara knows that better than most.) 

“It’s a… it’s a long story of how I fucked up today, and I don’t think I can handle any more of your disappointment today,” Alex says tiredly, and Kara seems to understand. Maybe, through the patterns of Alex’s heartbeat, she reassures herself she isn’t lying. 

That Alex is still here, that she came, means, after all, that the story’s ending was good. 

It wasn’t, and it really hasn’t ended, but Alex isn’t about to admit that.

“I’m sorry,” Alex says. “I’m a jerk, and I’m sorry. I was so… I was so angry, and—” 

Kara’s lip trembles. She asks, very quietly, “At me?” 

“God, no.” Alex pulls her into another brief hug. “No, Kara, you didn’t do anything wrong. You’re not responsible for Dad’s actions.” 

“You aren’t, either.” 

_I know that,_ Alex wants to reassure her, but does she,  really? 

Her dad had held her responsible for Kara’s safety since the moment she’d arrived on Earth, and when he was gone, Eliza had been alone with both of them, and grieving, and she’d continued the trend.  It’s okay, now,  because Alex can’t  imagine putting anything before her sister’s safety.  It’s grown to be part of who she is.  But it hasn’t been easy. 

When her dad had returned, Alex had held so fiercely to the hope that he was good, that he was on their side, that when he’d betrayed them, she’d held herself responsible for that, too. 

None of that  can be reversed in a day.  At this moment, she  can’t imagine anything but this nagging  _guilt_ and the hurt.  But she has a mission, and she has a family, and maybe one day that’ll make her be okay again. 

“I love you,” she says instead, a sentiment that she can never express enough. “I love you, Kara, and I’m sorry for your loss.” 

“You too.” Kara smiles through the fresh tears. With a glance at Alex, she says, “Jeremiah loved you a lot. Just maybe not in the right way.” 

She can live with that. 

* * *

“You drinking again, it… scared me,” Kara admits, at the same time that Kelly says, “The night sky in Midvale is stunning,” and Alex knows, right now, that she’s reached a crossroads of how the evening’s going to go. 

J’onn and Eliza are in the kitchen,  and from the way Kara keeps glancing in their direction sadly, they’re  talking about  Jeremiah. 

Alex is glad that someone is there for her mom—the way she wasn’t today, and the way she’d promised her dad to  be.  They’d decided on just the simple funeral; there weren’t enough people who’d really known him, or even known that he hadn’t died over a decade ago.  It’s just them now.  Kelly is there, of course, because she’s family, and because Alex can’t imagine her anywhere else but here,  with her, right now. 

She hadn’t known Jeremiah, but then, Alex doesn’t know if he even  would have  liked her. He hadn’t seemed to approve of  Maggie,  or of the whole gay thing, really. 

Then again, his mind had been a little preoccupied with being Cadmus’ secret spy. 

“Drinking _again_?” Kelly asks, and Kara says, “yes… Alex and I used to look at the stars every night,” and then they turn to her. 

“You say that as if I _never_ catch you flying at night looking at the stars when you should be in _bed,_ ” J’onn says sternly as he enters the room with a giant stack of pizza boxes. He winks at Alex and then turns to listen intently to Kara’s protests. 

Alex  turns to Kelly. “Tomorrow,” she promises quietly,  and mouths, “I love you,” for good measure, but Kelly doesn’t see it.  She’s already wrapped up in Alex’s arms. 

* * *

“Okay, so I’m in your costume, right, just that it was blue and black and definitely cooler than yours,” Alex says. She’s purposefully leaving out all the painful parts, the ugly parts where she’d forgotten who she was and was… happy with it. Happy enough, at least. 

Kara makes an indignant noise, and J’onn laughs. 

“So, I flew to the director of the DEO—which was you, J’onn, by the way—and guess what the first thing that happened was?” 

“I got kidnapped,” Kara blurts. J’onn and Eliza say, at once, “Someone kidnapped Kara.” 

Alex splutters. “Guys, I—I don’t get kidnapped _that often._ But… yeah.” 

“That’s the most realistic thing to ever come out of Andrea’s VR,” Kara insists, but there’s a sad edge around her mouth. 

Alex smiles softly at her. She remembers what Kara had told her when she’d knocked at Alex’s window in the middle of the night because she couldn’t sleep. A reality that Mxy had shown her where she’d been honest to Lena from the beginning—much too early for Alex’s taste—where they’d worked as partners, for the whole world to see. Then Lockwood had kidnapped Lena, and Kara had revealed her identity, and it had been wonderful, at first—until Lockwood had had every single one of Kara’s loved ones killed. 

Every. Single. One. 

It had made Alex ache all over, the thought of her sister having to endure that, just the thought of her having to consider the possibility.  Alex had known  that from the beginning, from the very beginning when a frightened twelve-year-old girl was dropped on their doorstep.  She’d known that Kara’s powers were a risk to her family. 

Then her dad died—the first time— and that knowledge had transformed into pain, which had eventually dulled down into a sharp reminder—to protect Kara at all costs. 

She’d gotten on that  plane, and her enemies had shot it from the sky.  Kara had saved her and put them all and herself at a greater risk than they’d even been able to imagine back then. 

But she’d also started something wonderful.  A movement of hope that spanned across the globe and touched countless lives,  and, most of all, Alex’s.  Her sister, the hero, protector of the people, and  endless inspiration. 

There’d been bitter pushbacks, for sure.  Alex almost drowning was the one that still visited her nightmares,  but there’d been others: kidnappings,  blackmails,  threats of all kinds.  Those horrible months of forgetting that’d turned their relationship inside out, and proven once and for all:  Kara without powers, without Krypton in her heart, wasn’t the sister that Alex wanted to know. 

In a morbid, twisted way, Alex  is thankful to Mxy for showing the most drastic consequences of Kara’s identity going public,  if only to loosen some of that guilt  around lying to Lena.  A move that Alex always supported, and now  they know first-hand  that it was the right choice. 

“Let’s talk about something else,” Alex insists. She thinks about Kara’s heartbroken expression that night as she’d said, _every morning when I wake up, I think about why I put on that—that cape, and every time, I’m terrified that this is the day it makes me lose you for good. Alex, I—_

_Let go of the guilt,_ Alex had whispered. She’s a hypocrite, but sometimes, that’s what it  takes to be a big sister.  _Kara, Kara. Look at me._ She’d brushed Kara’s hair out of her face,  cracked a smile.  _I’d never want you to take it off. Okay? You’re an inspiration. You’re, like… you’re the very best of us, you know that?_

Kelly had found them like that, cuddling in Alex’s huge bed on a Saturday morning. That day, quietly, trying not to wake up Kara, they’d said _I love you_ for the first time.

It was still very fresh. New, and exciting.

Today had been the second time.

Eliza and J’onn look like they want to protest  the ending of the story—and oh, she’ll  _regret_ telling them about this, especially tomorrow, when  everything ugly will make its way in again—but Kelly, wonderful, beautiful Kelly,  she takes one look at the Danvers sisters, at the worried glances they’re each throwing the other,  the strained smiles, and  mumbles,  drowsy, from her place on Alex’s shoulder, “Yeah, let’s go to sleep.” 

“It’s been a long day,” J’onn and Eliza agree simultaneously, with the same amount of parental worry, and Alex thinks to herself how lucky she is to have this. 

Family.

* * *

“Is it really alright for you to sleep in the living room?” Eliza looks apologetic. “I don’t mean to be old-fashioned, but my girls’ childhood beds are rather short, and I’d feel better if you could at least stretch your legs on your first night here in Midvale.” 

“It’s perfect, thank you,” Kelly says. Alex’s chest feels tight when she looks at her; purple pajamas that are just a little too big, borrowed from Alex; her smile softening the little worry crease between her brows after the long day she’s had taking care of her girlfriend. Kelly is so beautiful that Alex feels her heart constrict, and her mom is barely out of the room when she leans over and kisses her. 

Kelly softens to the touch, sinking into Alex like she’s exhaling, finally. Alex knows she hurt her today—if not through her harsh words then through the carelessness of her actions, by lying on that couch unmoving. She knows that tomorrow is going to be a tough day.

She smiles into her girlfriend’s lips, anyway. Whispers _I love you._ It goes unheard. But when Alex tiptoes out the door—feeling a bit like the lovestruck teenager she never really got to be—it doesn’t matter. They both know.

* * *

The moon sends slivers of light across the wooden planks. Alex watches it intently, the ghostly white light playing across the floor. Kara is across from her, turned in the direction of the window, her back to Alex. She’s not sure if she’s asleep or awake.

She counts the seconds, tries to determine the speed of the clouds moving by their window. She tries to count the stars, so much brighter here than in the city. Sleep won’t come to her tonight, Alex knows that. She just hopes Kara is doing better.

If she still had powers, she’d know. Amidst all of the chaos the virtual reality had been, she’d tried to think of her sister, of the way she saw the world day by day.

Flying—it was more natural to Alex than to most people.

A lot of the people she’d met at science fairs and in college, young, bright scientists, had been fixated on the _laws_ of science, at first. It was perfectly normal, and Alex had been like that, too. She was in med school, but she’d always been fascinated by so many different scientific fields of research, and she would’ve made a lot of friends if she hadn’t been so fixated on being _perfect,_ on graduating before anyone else.

Still, for all that rules made her feel secure, she’d never taken the laws of science for granted. She didn’t take gravity as a given. Jumping off twenty-story buildings was scary, but not impossible, with a little trust in her alien sister.

It still took her by surprise how much she loves flying.

Heat vision is neat, so is freeze breath, and super strength and speed. Being bulletproof is thrilling, to an extent, but Alex can deal with injuries. Flight, though, is unmatched. It feels safe, flying above the city; calm, and peaceful, and everything a fight isn’t. It feels _freeing,_ and even after barely a day, Alex _misses_ it.

When that thought slips away, she tries to recall the numbers they’d determined for Kara’s powers; how fast she can go, the temperature of her heat vision, at which point she can’t hear or see people anymore, but they get jumbled in her head. Alex is tired.

She can’t be tired.

There’s so much to think about, so many thoughts trying to squeeze into her mind, and the ones about her dad hurt the most. Alex craves numbness. Alcohol, training, a fight, even another trip to the VR would be preferable to _this._

She hadn’t even heard the start of her mom’s speech. The thought feels like a punch to the gut. She’d failed Kara, and her dad, and her whole family. _Nia_ was a better daughter to Eliza than her today, and Kelly, and couldn’t she just have pushed that anger _down_ like she always does?

It’s pathetic, really, being angry at her dead father.

Oh, god, she’d told Kelly that she couldn’t understand grief. Kelly, who’d been through so much loss—through so much tragedy, and trauma, who—

And _Kara,_ her little sister who _needed_ her, who’d lost her parents and her whole world and then Jeremiah, and her aunt, and Mon-El, and her mom again—and yet, always came out shining and beautiful and good, turned her anger into something productive, something inspiring and hopeful.

Her mom, and J’onn, who’d lost his family, too. Lost them in a brutal war. J’onn, who’d spent centuries on Earth, alone, and who’d always been like a father to Alex—she’d acted like the most selfish person on the whole fucking planet.

How do they put up with her? This family, that is so good and so loving, and who could’ve stood united in this new tragedy, this new grief, if not for her.

She’s a mess. A mess and a failure and a disappointment. Alex’s breathing goes ragged now, and she digs her nails into her palm, tears in her already bloodshot eyes.

She curls up into herself, presses her hands to the sides of her head. If only the thoughts would stop, if only she could get out of here, if only she were a better person, if only she could be _enough,_ if only—

“Alex.”

Kara’s voice makes her want to cry, if she wasn’t already. She doesn’t open her eyes—afraid that the kindness and love in Kara’s face will be too much, that she’ll snap—but she feels Kara crouching down beside her, quietly settling on the floor. She doesn’t know what this is, why her head is ringing and why her heart is racing and she’s lying in cold sweat and she feels like she can’t breathe fast enough.

“Stay with me, Alex,” Kara says quietly. “Tell me what you need.” It feels a lot like the phrases that Alex used to repeat when they were younger—and occasionally now—when Kara would get panic attacks, but that’s not what this is. This has never happened to her before.

Kara shifts, and Alex can feel her brush a strand of damp hair from her forehead, but it feels disconnected, somehow—there’s not enough air, or she can’t get it into her lungs fast enough, anyway she’s going to—

“Breathe with me, okay, Alex?” Kara mumbles. “I’ll count to—to ten, okay? Breathe with me. One.” She’s cold, and Alex can’t focus—but Kara keeps repeating the word, _one,_ until she tries.

_Two._

_Seven._

When they’ve reached ten, Alex doesn’t feel like she’s dying anymore. She’s lying in cold sweat, and painful crests are pressed into her palms, and she feels so weak she might throw up any second, but she can breathe.

Kara immediately settles an arm around her. “Your heart was going a hundred miles an hour,” she whispers, and suddenly, Alex can see that she’s not calm and composed like she seemed just a minute ago. Her eyes are wild and terrified. “I was so scared. I was about to fly you to the hospital.”

“I’m fine,” Alex mumbles, hugging her sister back tightly. “I’m sorry,” she says, and the tears on her cheeks haven’t quite dried, “I’ve been such a burden today, and a jerk, and I know that, I—I’m supposed to be the big sister. I’m sorry.”

“Sh, you’re not a burden,” Kara says, and her embrace is getting a little painful now. “You’re a jerk, and you’re my sister, and I love you.” She’s too quick to forgive, and it _kills_ Alex that she can’t find a single trace of insincerity on Kara’s face.

It’s almost like she’s forgiven her, like—that.

Rationally, this is realistic for Kara. It’s how they run. But nothing can ever just be that _easy._

“You… you wanna talk about what just happened?” Kara asks carefully. “And the things you said during dinner, about your virtual reality?”

“Tomorrow,” Alex says, once again, even more tired than before.

“Technically, it’s after midnight, so—”

“I _promise_ that tomorrow, we can talk. I just—”

“Okay.”

Alex smiles faintly. “How’re you holding up?”

“Okay, I think?” Kara looks away. “I mean, obviously I’m sad, but I just kind of—”

“It’s okay,” Alex says. “You don’t have to feel guilty for not feeling like I do, or for feeling—whatever. It’s a complicated situation.”

“That’s not even it.” Kara chews her lip. “It’s just… I know that sounds selfish, but… I care more about how you’re doing right now than about Jeremiah’s death. It’s, like… I thought we’d get more closure, but I’ve grieved him, and… knowing that he helped people, that feels good.” There’s a brief silence in which she’s searching for words. “It’s just, Jeremiah has been gone for so long. But you, you’ve always been there, and you’re hurting. I just… I’m really bad at dealing with that.”

Alex reaches out to squeeze her sister’s hand. “You’re not,” she says, the wheels in her head still turning over Kara’s words, “you’re… you mean the world to me. Without you, I’d just, like, I don’t know… I’d just disappear.”

They look at each other after that, for a while, and then Alex makes space for Kara on the bed, and they lean on each other, watching the night sky through the small window.

“Think you’ll be able to get some sleep?” Kara asks into the silence.

“Unlikely. You?”

“No, I’m too restless.”

A smile curls Kara’s lips, then, spreading tentatively over her face. Alex mock-leans away from her, frowning. “What’s happening?”

Kara takes her hand, pulls her to her feet. She makes a wide gesture with her hands, pointing towards the night sky. (Dramatic, as always.)

“Alex, Alex—” she singsongs, and suddenly Alex can’t help but mirror her smile brightly. “Do you want to go flying?”

* * *

“This is supposed to be healthy, you know, exercise before bed!” Kara yells over the cold wind whipping into their faces.

“Really? ‘Study suggests nightly flying will add years to your life’?”

Kara laughs. “Are you cold?”

“No!” Alex yells. “You made sure of that!” She’s in approximately six layers of cardigans and sweaters, but she’s not cold. The night sky is rushing by, Midvale’s lights and beyond those, the mountains stretching out beneath them.

“It’s beautiful,” Alex breathes, and in response, her sister holds her tighter. “Thank you… thank you for this.”

They’re so far up, and she feels _alive._ There’s just the moment, and her sister, and her hometown and the stars and moon above them. It’s cleansing, and maybe she doesn’t need flight of her own. Maybe this, in her sister’s arms, putting all her trust in her, _this_ is what she needs.

They’ve been far too wrapped up in the little details and problems of life that they’ve abandoned sister night, and haven’t even approached this new dynamic of working together. Alex vows that that’ll change now. She needs her family to keep her sane, to get her through the days, to stay in today even as all the aches and pains of tomorrow are looming over them.

“Of course,” Kara says as they go faster. “I’ve missed this!”

“Me too—” she’s cut off by Kara dropping quickly and suddenly, and then picking up speed again. She sees her sister’s grin from the corners of her eyes. “That wasn’t funny!”

“I really think it was!” Kara yells back, and the landscape rushes by, and the wind whips water into their faces, and the dark sky is everywhere, and they’re flying.


End file.
